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Experience and Education

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Experience and Education is the best concise statement on education ever published by John Dewey, the man acknowledged to be the pre-eminent educational theorist of the twentieth century. Written more than two decades after Democracy and Education (Dewey's most comprehensive statement of his position in educational philosophy), this book demonstrates how Dewey reformulated his ideas as a result of his intervening experience with the progressive schools and in the light of the criticisms his theories had received.

Analyzing both "traditional" and "progressive" education, Dr. Dewey here insists that neither the old nor the new education is adequate and that each is miseducative because neither of them applies the principles of a carefully developed philosophy of experience. Many pages of this volume illustrate Dr. Dewey's ideas for a philosophy of experience and its relation to education. He particularly urges that all teachers and educators looking for a new movement in education should think in terms of the deeper and larger issues of education rather than in terms of some divisive "ism" about education, even such an "ism" as "progressivism." His philosophy, here expressed in its most essential, most readable form, predicates an American educational system that respects all sources of experience, one that offers a true learning situation that is both historical and social, both orderly and dynamic.

91 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1938

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About the author

John Dewey

889 books695 followers
John Dewey was an American philosopher, psychologist and educational reformer whose ideas have been influential in education and social reform. Dewey, along with Charles Sanders Peirce and William James, is recognized as one of the founders of the philosophy of pragmatism and of functional psychology. He was a major representative of the progressive and progressive populist philosophies of schooling during the first half of the 20th century in the USA.

In 1859, educator and philosopher John Dewey was born in Burlington, Vermont. He earned his doctorate at Johns Hopkins University in 1884. After teaching philosophy at the University of Michigan, he joined the University of Chicago as head of a department in philosophy, psychology and education, influenced by Darwin, Freud and a scientific outlook. He joined the faculty of Columbia University in 1904. Dewey's special concern was reform of education. He promoted learning by doing rather than learning by rote. Dewey conducted international research on education, winning many academic honors worldwide. Of more than 40 books, many of his most influential concerned education, including My Pedagogic Creed (1897), Democracy and Education (1902) and Experience and Education (1938). He was one of the founders of the philosophy of pragmatism. A humanitarian, he was a trustee of Jane Addams' Hull House, supported labor and racial equality, and was at one time active in campaigning for a third political party. He chaired a commission convened in Mexico City in 1937 inquiring into charges made against Leon Trotsky during the Moscow trials. Raised by an evangelical mother, Dewey had rejected faith by his 30s. Although he disavowed being a "militant" atheist, when his mother complained that he should be sending his children to Sunday school, he replied that he had gone to Sunday School enough to make up for any truancy by his children. As a pragmatist, he judged ideas by the results they produced. As a philosopher, he eschewed an allegiance to fixed and changeless dogma and superstition. He belonged to humanist societies, including the American Humanist Association. D. 1952.

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Profile Image for max.
187 reviews20 followers
March 29, 2020
Many of the world's greatest authors have weighed in on the subject of how children should be taught. The Greeks' main educational theorist was none other than Plato, who wrote with great clarity and precision (although some of his ideas, like getting rid of the poets, were preposterous). The Romans had Quintilian, whose massive treatise, "The Orator's Education," is elegantly written and chock full of sensible educational principles. Two thousand years later in the United States of America, we have John Dewey, whose clumsy, opaque writing is so bad that it actually hurts to read it. He simply lacks the requisite skills as a writer to make his subject comprehensible.

Even conceding that Dewey's ideas were distorted and corrupted by those who misunderstood his message, he nevertheless endures to this day as the high priest of progressive education. This book will give you a pretty good idea of its central tenets. In Dewey's view, traditional education consisted (in his own words) of:

imposition from above;
external discipline;
acquisition of isolated skills and techniques by drill;
preparation for a more or less remote future;
static aims and materials (pp. 19-20).

Note his obvious dislike of such distasteful things as "discipline," "skills," and "drill." As for "static aims and materials," Dewey doesn't bother to elaborate on what exactly that means, but we can be sure that it is an evil that must be rooted out and banished from his brave new schoolroom.

Dewey wrote a lot, and I am familiar only with this work. Here, he comes across less as a philosopher than a polemicist, perhaps even a propagandist. He constantly sets up, then knocks down the (false) straw man of traditional education. This, we are reminded, is the rigid, authoritarian schoolmaster who insists upon the memorization of facts with no regard for their context, who expects children to begin to master the details of such alien subjects as mathematics, history, and the English language. The desks are lined up, the rote lesson begins, the switch is ready to come down on the backside of the errant pupil.

Enter John Dewey, romantic theorist, disciple of Rousseau and savior of American education. In Dewey's view, schools were all wrong: they were prisons where students were forced to learn things that were impossible to learn because they were unconnected with their "experience." The people who ran these schools simply marched blindly in lockstep with a "received tradition" (read: traditional body of academic knowledge) which they neither understood nor felt any need to question. Because of teachers' inability to connect "isolated" subjects with the "experience" of their students, the results were foreordained: boredom, distraction, failure.

In educational circles, Dewey's ideas are worshipped with all of the dogmatic adherence of religious fundamentalists. I was required to read this book as part of an educational certification program I enrolled in. (I have reread it since.) Not surprisingly, no book having anything to do with the virtues of traditional education was on the list, because according to Dewey and his ardent disciples, traditional education simply has no virtues. And if, within the schools of education, you dare to question the premises of Dewey's educational philosophy, you are an instant pariah. This is perhaps the most dismaying feature of the education schools today: in the very place where robust, critical debate should be occurring about the aims and methods of education, debate is not welcomed at all. You either accept the correctness of Dewey's views, or you are wrong. In this respect the ed schools are more like Soviet gulags or communist re-education camps than anything resembling a university.

One wonders what kind of teachers Dewey had as a youngster. They must have been mediocre, uninspired drudges who lacked any imagination, creativity, or sympathetic understanding of their young charges. How else could he set out to attack "traditional" education as vehemently as he did? For centuries it was called simply "education," and only came to be vilified as "traditional" when the progressive educators sought to dismantle it.

I would suggest a very different view of traditional education. In place of the dull pedant repeatedly conjured up by Dewey, imagine a teacher who has acquired an education without ever having stepped inside an Education School. Imagine someone who has read and studied seriously, knows and understands a subject with great depth, and has graduated with honors. Imagine, too, that this educator possesses the ability -- along with patience, intelligence, and warmth -- to draw students into a love of science or mathematics or language or history by virtue of superior training, communication skills, and knowledge of how children think and develop. Imagine as well a teacher who insists on students' acquisition of essential skills such as mathematical proficiency and a knowledge of proper English grammar -- regardless of whether these are perceived by the student to be connected with his "experience." Alas, this is the traditional teacher whose existence Dewey does not and cannot acknowledge, because if he did his arguments would crumble like a sand castle.
Profile Image for Dave Schaafsma.
Author 6 books32k followers
January 28, 2016
The most concise statement of Dewey's philosophy of education, and an analysis of traditional vs. progressive education with respect to experience. For a longer treatment, more complete treatment, read Democracy and Education.

“There is no such thing as educational value in the abstract. The notion that some subjects and methods and that acquaintance with certain facts and truths possess educational value in and of themselves is the reason why traditional education reduced the material of education so largely to a diet of predigested materials.” ― John Dewey, Experience and Education

“The most important attitude that can be formed is that of desire to go on learning.”
― John Dewey, Experience and Education (yay to all of you reading this that read regularly and post on Goodreads and keep on reading and learning!)

“"Preparation' is a treacherous idea. In a certain sense every experience should do something to prepare a person for later experiences of a deeper and more expansive quality. That is the very meaning of growth, continuity, reconstruction of experience. But it is a mistake to suppose that the mere acquisition of a certain amount of arithmetic, geography, history, etc., which is taught and studied because it may be useful at some time in the future, has this effect, and it is a mistake to suppose that acquisition of skills in reading and figuring will automatically constitute preparation for their right and effective use under conditions very unlike those in which they were acquired.”
― John Dewey, Experience and Education

“There is no such thing as educational value in the abstract. The notion that some subjects and methods and that acquaintance with certain facts and truths possess educational value in and of themselves is the reason why traditional education reduced the material of education so largely to a diet of predigested materials.” ― John Dewey, Experience and Education

“The most important attitude that can be formed is that of desire to go on learning.”
― John Dewey, Experience and Education

“We always live at the time we live and not at some other time, and only by extracting at each present time the full meaning of each present experience are we prepared for doing the same thing in the future.”
― John Dewey, Experience and Education

“Preparation" is a treacherous idea. In a certain sense every experience should do something to prepare a person for later experiences of a deeper and more expansive quality. That is the very meaning of growth, continuity, reconstruction of experience. But it is a mistake to suppose that the mere acquisition of a certain amount of arithmetic, geography, history, etc., which is taught and studied because it may be useful at some time in the future, has this effect, and it is a mistake to suppose that acquisition of skills in reading and figuring will automatically constitute preparation for their right and effective use under conditions very unlike those in which they were acquired.”
― John Dewey, Experience and Education

“Collateral learning in the way of formation of enduring attitudes, of likes and dislikes, may be and often is much more important than the spelling lesson or lesson in geography or history that is learned. For these attitudes are fundamentally what count in the future. The most important attitude that can be formed is that of desire to go on learning. If impetus in this direction is weakened instead of being intensified, something much more than mere lack of preparation takes place. The pupil is actually robbed of native capacities which otherwise would enable him [sic] to cope with the circumstances that he meets in the course of his life. We often see persons who have had little schooling and in whose case the absence of set schooling proves to be a positive asset. They have at least retained their native common sense and power of judgement, and its exercise in the actual conditions of living has given them the precious gift of ability to learn from the experiences they have.” ― John Dewey, Experience and Education

“Collateral learning in the way of formation of enduring attitudes, of likes and dislikes, may be and often is much more important than the spelling lesson or lesson in geography or history that is learned.” ― John Dewey, Experience and Education

“It is [the teacher's] business to be on the alert to see what attitudes and habitual tendencies are being created. In this direction he[sic] must, if he is an educator, be able to judge what attitudes are actually conducive to continued growth and what are detrimental. He must, in addition, have that sympathetic understanding of individuals as individuals which gives him an idea of what is actually going on in the minds of those who are learning.” ― John Dewey, Experience and Education

“There is, I think, no point in the philosophy of progressive education which is sounder than its emphasis upon the importance of the participation of the learner in the formation of the purposes which direct his [sic] activities in the learning process, just as there is no defect in traditional education greater than its failure to secure the active cooperation of the pupil in construction of the purposes involved in his studying.” ― John Dewey, Experience and Education
Profile Image for Timothy Darling.
331 reviews49 followers
June 15, 2012
This book, originally written in 1938 has some important things to say. That children are not built to sit for hours and listen to lectures, but rather to be in motion. That experience is a more effective teacher than rote learning. That ignoring the voice of the student in education is to disconnect from the process by which she will learn. I think Dewey is right on many fronts, including the idea that a thoroughly planned and skillfully executed experimentally based education is more effective than a traditional face-front classroom model.

That said, I must observe a few things. First, if 75 years of promoting this view have brought us to standardized testing (measuring the conesequences of experience) and teachers that are pressed to account for every moment of every lesson we are somewhere missing a crucial point. In the modern classroom we shout for smaller class sizes, why? Because a teacher must give greater attention to individuals than he can do in the present circumstances. This is an unintended consequence of Dewey's method. Experience is a better teacher. Unfortunately, that means each student's previous experience and capacity for new experience must be taken into account more individually than Dewey seems to realize. The mechanism for teaching is much more tailor made and the general nature and capacity of public education is ignored. Certainly traditional methods may be less effective, but they do work on some level.

Also, Dewey decries a traditional classroom that places primary value on the past (cultural heritage) and says instead we must move the children into the future. This is hypothetically true, but ignores the fact that society and many of the people among whom the child will interact are products and expressions of that culture. Certainly we want everyone to be able to think creatively in unexpected situations, but Dewey does not adequately demonstrate that traditional learning lacks in this regard. After all, he must be a product of such an education and he seems quite able to formulate new ideas.

In fact the traditional classroom is not dead. This is a consequence of necessity. It is necessary for teachers to model what they themselves have learned and will resort to these paradigms when newer paradigms seem faulty. It is necessary because of the massive classroom sizes and the sheer volume of information that must be assimilated in the modern education. It is necessary because not everything can be experienced but some things must be learned in the abstract. At best Dewey preaches a method that needs to be given more and more thorough exploration but cannot be bought wholesale without risking the disintegration of the educational machine. There is no way our superstructure can handle the expense of an endeavor that would tax personal resources on such an atomic scale.
Profile Image for Davis Smith.
879 reviews105 followers
March 3, 2025
Dull as dishwater, but critically essential for understanding modern education and the basic tenets that underlie today's public school system. I was surprised by how many premises and concepts Dewey shares with liberal education, but by the time that "Progressive Organization of Subject Matter" rolled around, he's fully in the realm of worshiping at the altar of Almighty Science. Sadly, too many folks who think that they're advocating for classical education are really just desiring a move back from Marxism to Dewey when they say things like, "Don't you wish that children learned how, not what to think, and that they learn skills for productive lives in student-centered, collaborative environments?" Most of the vacuous, gag-inducing clichés in the educational world can be traced back to Dewey. Nonetheless, a friend of mine says that "Dewey is a good accountability buddy for classical education," and I agree. Also, keep in mind that his attacks on "traditional education" are not really directed toward the heritage from the Greeks, medievals, and humanists; but the peculiarly American brand of utilitarian education that emphasizes the formation of what Benjamin Rush called "republican machines." As such, his critiques are fair and helpful, but his fundamentally Darwinian premises don't allow him to grasp the full picture.
Profile Image for ladydusk.
556 reviews265 followers
March 3, 2025
I mean, this was like reading mud soup. Definitely a challenging read and I finally had to resort to an audio version while reading along on my kindle.

I was trying to read receptively - where I understood what it was that Dewey was saying - but everything I understood I disagreed with.

No wonder moderns want our children to be in institutions from birth up so they can provide the proper "experiences" in order so that learning can happen. And yet these experiences mustn't be systematized but natural to the child (Common Core would be anathema to Dewey, too!) And experiences must be different based on the environment the child is growing up in? I mean ... it makes no sense.

No wonder we must have colleges of education - they're supposed to teach this philosophy of choosing experiences to offer to children considering both what has gone before, it's effect on now, and how it will be built upon in the future. Authentic and immediate, but not systematized or pre planned. Each child must be taken into account.

Teachers have authority in their classroom, according to Dewey, but they aren't actually supposed to use it - that is "imposition" on the children. They're supposed to be part of the give-and-take community who decide to learn the unimposed but all important experiences?

There isn't a body of knowledge that is useful, except there is.

Oh - and cause and effect behaviorism is to be utilized because the scientific method tells us that this works and we wouldn't want to return to pre-scientific methods.

I marked a ton of notes that you can read if you want. It does seem awkward that Dewey doesn't want a top-down educational scheme - he even says he's not trying to tell us what to do - but it seems to him that this is what we really should do.

I read this for my 2023 5x5 Category "Bad Boys of Educational Philosophy" and ... totally fits. This speech (book) very much reminds me of Withers in That Hideous Strength who qualifies every statement into meaninglessness.
Profile Image for Jonathan Terrington.
596 reviews597 followers
July 26, 2012

It is highly curious that outside the arena of teaching the process of education itself remains very much misunderstood. In fact until you actually enter into the process of teaching - education seems very much like an act of guiding others with your bountiful knowledge. Of course very few realise that teaching is as much about learning as it is about passing knowledge. And that education also extends far beyond merely providing knowledge. It is however highly important that educators properly understand their work as they are dealing in and with a moral profession. They are working not with instruments of stone like builders but with flesh and blood people. John Dewey's work here is therefore a valuable insight into education from a theoretical viewpoint (which helps contribute to a practical stance on education). Although writing in a different era it appears that many of his points are still valid today as our education system (particularly in Australia) has not developed much past the traditional ideas.

Chapter 1

In chapter one Dewey raises the idea of progressive vs traditional education. He makes the solid points that traditional education is stagnant and static. It believes that what it teaches is the finished product. And from a philosophical and personal view I believe that much education is still dealt with in this way. I note that today many theories are taught as fact, something I very much disagree with. I think of that type of teaching as more indoctrinating. If we properly were to accept that perhaps these theories are not the finished product (and many of them may be flawed) we would encourage greater individual thought. And I believe personally at this point that education should serve the purpose of encouraging the individual to be an individual and to think for themselves, having their own opinion on issues.

Chapter 2

In his second chapter Dewey explains the need for a theory of experience. While I am still trying to grasp the full idea I see some of what Dewey is explaining. He very much explains how experience contributes to learning and how a conditioning method of education does not do much to allow for learning of practical skills and abilities. Many teachers will be challenged by students asking questions like: when will we use the quadratic formula in 'real life'? And that is what Dewey is explaining. That students experience school and they often view some things they learn as unnecessary experiences or perhaps even negative experiences. The question should become one of relevance then rather than curriculum. The quadratic formula should be seen in the understanding of aiding logical thinking (much like how Christopher sees maths in The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time) and the relevance of the experience of learning should be able to be understood. But too often it is not. As a (hopefully) future Literature/English/History teacher I hope to be able to show and educate the relevance of studying fictional novels and past events. That they do affect our modern experiences.

"Just as no man lives or dies to himself, so no experience lives and dies to itself. Wholly independent of desire or intent, every experience lives on in future experiences."

Chapter 3

Chapter 3 explores the criteria of experience. Dewey uses this chapter to look in detail at the idea of negative and positive experience. He refers to the idea of someone gaining experience as a burglar in particular and uses that to show what experience should be for in education. There is a lot of depth and detail in this chapter but ultimately Dewey's argument boils down to discussing why we do things the way we do. For instance we have democratic systems he argues because we see through experience that they are better for human life. He also looks at how experiences outside of a classroom contribute to experiences inside a classroom and that teachers need to be aware of the intersection of the social community and the classroom.

Chapter 4

Chapter 4 examines society and education. In particular the idea of social control and education. Dewey points out that some level of social control is needed in education. He uses the metaphor of how a children's game must have rules in order to provide mediation and allow for smoother running and enjoyment. In the same way education needs a level of social control but not to the point where it impedes on the ability of students to have a relevant experience and to mature. The question then becomes where to draw the line so that education is not about homogenising students and creating an end product of citizens for some supposedly glorious democracy which is no democratic idea at all.

Chapter 5

Dewey then communicates what he believes the role of freedom is within the classroom. I found the ideas about freedom itself interesting from a philosophical point of view. The idea that was hinted at in particular about that perhaps to be free we have to fulfil a purpose and role. This in particular tied into the next topic Dewey raised.

Chapter 6

Dewey looks at the meaning of purpose in Chapter 6. In many ways this chapter is designed to look at the questions students ask such as 'why do we need to learn this?' And in many other ways it is designed to look at the purpose of teachers, teaching and experience in regards to teaching. One idea I particularly noted was the idea of how purpose defines individuals. (Think about it we all identify ourselves more often by what we do than who we are - I'm a writer, reader and teacher for instance)

Chapter 7

This penultimate chapter observes the idea of subject-matter and education. Dewey looking at how experience and subjects like English, Math and History come together. This is a lengthy chapter and ties together much of Dewey's overall argument to show how his philosophy of experience is linked to education.

Chapter 8

In this final chapter Dewey summarises his argument, noting that education must move either backwards or forwards. He concludes that he has included the points that must be addressed for the later to occur in 'Experience and Education'. That being that educators must have a sound philosophy of experience so that education does not become pseudo-education.

Whether you agree with John Dewey's philosophy or not this is an important and informative text to analyse and read in regards to education. Because Teaching is linked to experience and the community in many ways and part of becoming a teacher is learning to adopt a professional outlook and manner. There is a lot of information in this relatively short text and I certainly have not retained it all. I do however think that personally there was a lot of useful pedagogical ideas in there and I do recommend it to anyone wanting to look at education and philosophy.
Profile Image for Kealoha.
2 reviews1 follower
February 2, 2009
Considered to be one of the classic must read books for any educator, it discusses traditional and progressive education in a very non-confrontational and honest way. If you ever read any writings for Dewey, make this one your first read. It's a bit tough to read at times, and I found myself re-reading sections of the material to get a better understanding as sometimes I lost my way or just didn't get it. Worth the read and worth the time spent to understand where Dewey is coming from.

Profile Image for youj.
200 reviews
October 5, 2022
his writing is not accessible although his ideas are good. tb to my sociological theories readings that made me want to vomit
Profile Image for Ruth Parker.
766 reviews33 followers
January 12, 2020
I enjoy reading about John Dewey’s theories and ideas. While some are of course outdated and perhaps have been disproven as effective educational theories and practices, his ideas and advice to teachers still stands strong.
A great read for those in education, interested in education or with children of their own.
Profile Image for Mehrsa.
2,245 reviews3,593 followers
September 11, 2018
This is more of a treatise than book, but I think all these years later and it's still accurate. I wish our education system could be set up more like what Dewey and his chicago school envisioned. Learn by doing instead of by instruction.
Profile Image for Saif Elhendawi.
139 reviews
November 17, 2021
Amazing exploration of the role of experience in education and how the scientific method can be applied to the pedagogical process. What is interesting is that Dewey doesn't set out to advance arguments defending progressive or traditional education. In other words, he stays out of the politics and disagreements. Instead he focuses on development of the principles of a theory of experience and applying it to education. He explores the freedom of the student and how it can be guaranteed while still have a system or organizational procedure that governs the education of said student. It can be a bit of dull read, mainly because his use of examples or anecdotes is limited. This is offset by it being one of the shortest books i have ever read (less than a 100 pages), making it a relatively easy read. I recommend for anyone interested in understanding the foundation of modern educational philosophy and evidence based approaches to schooling.
Profile Image for Promethea.
285 reviews5 followers
April 21, 2024
If you wanna know who shaped modern day education system, there you go. He did.
Profile Image for Cherylann.
558 reviews
February 6, 2011
I'm not found of theoretical reading - call it a side-effect of working on a doctorate while working full-time and cramming 500 - 1000 pages of reading into a two day period. So it was no surprise that I wasn't excited to pick up Dewey, but I needed to do because I have a proposal to write. I know Dewey. At least I think I know Dewey. As a traditionally-trained teacher, I first learned about Dewey 20+ years ago as an undergraduate. I know how others (professors and researchers) have interpreted Dewey, but I have not read anything of Dewey's until now. I found that this rather concise paperback first published in 1938 still resonates with today's educational debates. Dewey's lays out his argument clearly and made it easy for me to pull his ideas into my theoretical framework, which is a good thing. As I read, took notes, and talked back to the text, the compelling thought I had was that our policymakers need to read Dewey and spend some time in our classrooms, and then they may decide that we're veering off-track when it comes to education in this country.
Profile Image for Kelly.
269 reviews14 followers
October 28, 2011
This concise, incredibly dense volume on Dewey's philosophy of education is as relevant today as it was when it was published in 1938. Dewey argues that students need rich experiences to learn, and encourages a cooperative learning environment that teaches studenst not only content, but also the skills to function as citizens in a democratic society. Remarkably, Dewey's theory experiential education, which he developed through observation, has been since proven to be completely aligned with the way that the brain actually learns (see The Art of Changing the Brain, an excellent book on the biology of learning). This is a must-read for all teachers.
Profile Image for Kony.
437 reviews255 followers
September 18, 2012
Smart and sensible. Maybe even timeless (we'll see in a century or so).

Good reminder for learners and teachers that their respective roles are, ideally, complementary and overlapping; that public education is essentially a social process serving social purposes; and that new knowledge is useful only if it speaks meaningfully to past experience and lays groundwork for a richer series of future experiences.

Pithiness is both this book's strength and its weakness -- strength because it imparts its claims swiftly and effectively; weakness because it's over before you can stop to scratch your head.
Profile Image for Anna.
435 reviews4 followers
September 8, 2023
This short little book was surprisingly really enjoyable & is certainly important in the field of education. As someone a few years removed from the k-12 classroom, yet still constantly thinking about the developmental and social aspects of effective and compassionate education, this really spoke to what I've observed and experienced about the philosophy of education that still fights to gain traction today (published 1938!!!). I really vibed with the pragmatism of Dewey's approach and found it helpful thinking about how we can shape students as learners and people in the future.
Profile Image for Allie Osborn.
51 reviews
April 23, 2021
Though he writes charitably, Dewey’s words are dangerous. The effect of this small book on modern education cannot be measured, and that’s not a good thing.
Profile Image for Jessica.
376 reviews14 followers
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June 13, 2024
I was not impressed. Actually, I was somewhat alarmed. Actually, I was very alarmed.

I should say that the dominant impression I received from this was that it hardly taught me anything, and that’s never a point in favor of content like this, from which I expect to learn. I’ll scale that criticism back a bit by conceding that these chapters were delivered as a lecture series, and if you read Dewey’s academic work, it’s a lot heavier on sources (i.e., there are sources), and simply a lot heavier (i.e., dense). The kernel of this slim book was that there is traditional education, and that’s where desks are nailed to floors, and there’s progressive education, and that’s where kids handle post-its and play-doh, and neither really is sufficient on its own … except a truly successful education is really just the progressive kind done right. Up until about the last ten pages of this book, I was genuinely convinced by the passes at situational interactivity between objective and internal conditions for education – the conciliatory gestures Dewey made to the tenets of a pedagogy that progressivism rang out, – but it was right around the end that this bipartisanship struck me as a feint. And it was almost at the end, when it became clear that Dewey’s experiential method was really just the experimental method, and that this was really just empiricism, that this feint struck me as dangerous.

Am I really surprised, judging by Dewey’s preeminent identification with pragmatism? Okay, maybe not. But I’ll tell you why I’m scared, and that’s because of sentences like this: “scientific method is the only authentic means at our command for getting at the significance of our everyday experiences of the world in which we live.” Here’s another passage: “We are told, on one hand, that the complexity of human relations, domestic and international, and on the other hand, the fact that human beings are so largely creatures of emotion and habit, make impossible large-scale social planning and direction by intelligence. This view would be more credible if any systematic effort, beginning with early education and carried on through the continuous study and learning of the young, had ever been undertaken with a view to making the method of intelligence, exemplified in science, supreme in education. There is nothing in the inherent nature of habit that prevents intelligent method from becoming itself habitual; and there is nothing in the nature of emotion to prevent the development of intense emotional allegiance to the method.” This is hardly any better than Adorno’s appeal that “education must transform itself into sociology” – I can’t tell which makes me shudder more. First of all, this talk of cultivating habit and intense emotional allegiance smacks of – and I’ll just say it – brainwashing. Second of all, the idealization of scientific method approaches – and I’ll just say it again – scientism. And finally, the scariest thing of all is that we’re presently submerged in both, and the academic space is very much not proof against either. What we have on our hands – perhaps I would say, what has been brought into fuller and more potent being since Dewey wrote – is an attitude towards reality that has dispensed with the humility that should accompany, if not define, method-making and knowledge-gathering based only on the evidence of what we can perceive. It is a gross stroke of arrogance to profess that empirical inquiry “is the only authentic means at our command for getting at the significance of our everyday experiences of the world in which we live.” I could get behind the mediational project of this book, though I did not find it illuminating, but I certainly cannot support the fundamental position that belies the appearance of that approach.

Not rated because philosophy; but also, boo.
Profile Image for Marnie.
32 reviews
January 9, 2025
Major mixed feelings about this. I think the two major negative factors are: a) the writing style; b) a certain lack of profundity because the book was written in 1938 and much of the changes for which Dewey calls have already been instituted in education, to varying degrees of efficacy.

Some of it, I feel, did go over my head. But I feel that is both a combination of my not being a student of education studies, and also the writing itself did not do much to articulate itself too clearly.

But I agreed very strongly with Dewey’s assertion that an ‘education continuum’, that is, the continuity of education as it informs experience, irrespective of the specific subject-matter in each circumstance - that this continuum is where the value of education lies. It is completely true (to me, at least) and I noted some similarities between this and what Neil Postman wrote in Amusing Ourselves To Death about the pitfalls of disconnectedness and episodic-thinking.

Ultimately, I think a lot of what was said felt redundant in that it didn’t need clarifying. But I should imagine that at the time of publication, these things were quite profound. It is taken for granted now to know that exclusively static environments are not the most conducive to learning, for example.

I do have a bone to pick, though, with the amount of responsibility placed on the educator to execute what is, in my opinion, an impossible level of individualisation based on the varying experiences of each student. It just isn’t feasible to base an education on such, and I think it’s a convoluted and stupid argument to make, because it is impossible to execute in all levels - from state, to school, to teacher, to parent, to student. But perhaps this is just because he was writing in a time when this approach was absolutely unheard of against the traditional fixed structure of organisation by external forces to the total exclusion of the student’s experience, so he overshot.

I appreciated his cautioning against the total withdrawal of input from the educator as a potential consequence of fearing this will take away the freedom of the student. I quite strongly feel that universities have this problem. Or at least, some of my lecturers do. The ones who don’t have this problem are the ones whose classes I have gained a richer and ever-evolving educational experience from. Ultimately, if education is characterised by experience, then for the educator to utilise his experience to guide that of the student is fitting, so long as it is not asserted at the expense of the student’s.

It’s one I will probably re-read down the line. As with anything, I will likely gain something different from the book in a matter of months.
Profile Image for Anthony.
383 reviews3 followers
June 22, 2023
“On the other hand, if an experience arouses curiosity, strengthens initiative, and sets up desires and purposes that are sufficiently intense to carry a person over dead places in the future, continuity works in a very different way. Every experience is a moving force.”

I realized fairly quickly any idealistic notions of day to day of teaching wouldn't pan out. As much as I enjoyed talking about themes in stories or sharing my favorite poetry with the kids, it wasn't for them. So what could I do?

I could find stuff that interested them. I could connect questions about their own experiences to the texts we read in class. I could actually try to invent ways to teach then the traditional lecture. Did it always work?

Absolutely not. But - when it did, it went fantastic. And sometimes - I'll admit, maybe my lessons weren't as effective as I thought they were but the ability to still find ways to connect it to their lived experiences hopefully still connected with them on some level. As Dewey says above, every experience is a moving force.

It may not be towards mastering the skills of effective argumentative writing, but maybe, just maybe it was enough to carry them over into the future towards being a kind, reflective and critical thinking human being.
Profile Image for Gemington.
583 reviews1 follower
July 1, 2023
I wanted to read a short take on education by Dewey. Almost 100 years ago, what were folks thinking about education? What did they get right? What intervened?

Dewey is making the claim here that education needs to be grounded in structured and evidence-informed experiences. We need to bring our whole selves to school and the teacher needs to weigh our individuality against the experiences she plans. This planning is almost somewhat constrained. Dewey also presents the idea of co-construction of knowledge, and of all classroom members being a part of the classroom’s community. While much of the language has evolved since this publication, I think we continue to grapple with and benefit from the philosophical questions that Dewey lays out here.
Profile Image for Matt Hutson.
307 reviews107 followers
September 20, 2021
Written in 1938 and still very relevant to education today. John Dewey is a bit ranty and wordy even though the book is very short. A bit repetitive in certain aspects but he brings up many great points about how education needs to use past and present knowledge in connection with students' prior knowledge to create experience that will be relevant for the students' future.
Profile Image for Holly Hillard.
372 reviews6 followers
April 7, 2022
Way back in undergrad, we had to pick a theory of education that we aligned with the best, and I remember choosing the progressive philosophy. It’s been over a decade since I first decided that. Now, I work at an actual progressive school and I’m delving back into some of the theory.
Profile Image for Paige.
154 reviews1 follower
November 5, 2020
4.5/5
I'm happy that I can say I went to a progressive elementary school! I firmly belive in Dewey's philosophy of education and it's amazing that his ideas have stayed grounded in the test of time.
Profile Image for Adah B..
115 reviews4 followers
Read
November 18, 2022
…huh? I’m not sure this is going to be as helpful to my thesis project as I thought. I need a little more background, so off to do more research I go.
Profile Image for Samuel Sadler.
58 reviews
March 10, 2025
Dewey actually isn't that bad. Certainly not an end in himself, but he's got some helfpul things.
Profile Image for Rod Naquin.
154 reviews2 followers
August 12, 2021
Read/heard a few critiques of Dewey recently, and this book helped me better understand his progressive approach. The title does a lot of it; or, “experience is the means and goal of education.” Not too much beef w it, because I’m so into Vygotsky that this theorizing doesn’t bother me
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